Although I was thinking this in my heart, I still asked him, “What does the ‘calamity’ that Senior Monk spoke of mean?”

The Old Monk replied, “So-called calamity comes from karmic retribution. If you don’t believe it, you can go to the Mahavira Hall and see for yourself. You will understand! Amitabha…”

I was completely bewildered, thinking, could it be that this calamity will be verified in the Mahavira Hall? I glanced at the Old Monk, and saw that they didn’t seem like the kind of people who would lie, so I immediately prepared to head toward the Mahavira Hall. But as I was leaving the abbot’s quarters, I couldn’t help but turn back and ask, “Senior Monk, do ghosts really exist in this world?”

Senior Monk said, “The world contains all things; how could the existence of ghosts be determined by the words of just one person?”

Although the Old Monk didn’t answer me directly, I could tell from his words that he meant ghosts do exist in this world. I didn’t know whether I should believe this Old Monk in front of me—after all, Chairman Mao’s weight in my heart was much greater than his—but the fact that the Old Monk said the Mahavira Hall could witness karmic calamity made me very curious, so I immediately hurried toward the hall.

It wasn’t far from the abbot’s quarters to the Mahavira Hall; in less than three or four minutes, I arrived at the entrance of the hall. As soon as I reached the outside, I heard shouts coming from inside, as if they were all working together on something. Looking around outside the hall, it was almost a scene of ruins: a two-meter-tall stone incense burner in front of the Mahavira Hall had already been toppled, and some stone tablets and stone Buddhas in the square were broken into pieces and scattered everywhere, looking desolate.

I poked my head into the entrance of the hall and saw dozens of Red Guards from the school, led by their captain, shouting as they prepared to use ropes to pull down the giant Buddha statue inside the Mahavira Hall!

That Buddha statue was enormous, weighing several tons, and those dozens of Red Guards were shouting slogans, “Heave-ho! Heave-ho!” as they pulled. At that moment, one of my classmates inside saw me and waved, shouting, “Edward, you little rascal, hiding out here to slack off—aren’t you coming in to help pull this thing down?”

Hearing my classmate call me like that, I was about to nod and go in, but suddenly remembered what the Old Monk had just said, and my heart started pounding—I didn’t know what to do.

Just as I was hesitating, the dozens of Red Guards inside gave a loud shout, and the giant Buddha statue inside the hall was finally pulled down by them. With a “boom,” it crashed to the ground, fragments flying everywhere, dust billowing throughout the hall, and the Red Guards were thrown into chaos, their strange cries echoing endlessly!

I stood outside the hall, watching this scene, terrified. The dust was so thick I couldn’t see what was happening inside, but just hearing those screams from within was enough to scare me—I knew something terrible had happened inside!

At that moment, I was frozen, panicked and at a loss.

“Amitabha, this is retribution!”

Just then, the Old Monk who had been locked in the abbot’s quarters were suddenly standing behind me—I didn’t know when they had come out. I turned to look at the Old Monk, realizing that what they had said about karmic calamity had really come true, and a feeling of having narrowly escaped death surged in my heart.

Soon, the dust inside the hall gradually settled, so I hurried in, and then I saw a scene I would never forget for the rest of my life. The hall was filled with the corpses of Red Guards, lying all over the place! They lay there quietly—none lightly injured, none seriously injured—all the Red Guards were dead, and it seemed as if they had been dead for a long time. Not a single breath or pulse, not a single movement—the entire hall was filled with the aura of death!

Panic-stricken, I approached the bodies, and then discovered that the blood flowing from them was actually black—pools and pools of black blood covered the floor of the hall. This black blood looked as if it were poisoned. But I knew they weren’t poisoned—they had been killed by the flying fragments of the Buddha statue, because their bodies were pierced all over with shards! But those shards were very strange—long and thin, almost like bones.

At this point, I was so frightened I couldn’t speak. All dead, not one left. I slowly glanced at the toppled Buddha statue to the side, and saw that its belly was filled with dense, white bones! Yes, the Buddha’s belly was full of human bones, packed tightly together—I couldn’t tell how many…

I was so terrified I nearly lost my soul. There were human bones inside the Buddha statue’s belly, and all those Red Guards had been killed by the flying human bones—how could that not be terrifying? Seeing this, I was scared out of my wits, turned and bolted out of the Mahavira Hall, collapsing onto the steps outside, my legs so weak I couldn’t take another step…

Later, I learned from the Old Monk that the Buddha statue’s belly did indeed contain human bones, but those remains were the bones of the most highly respected Senior Monk of the temple over the centuries. After each revered Senior Monk passed away, their disciples would collect their bones and store them in the Buddha statue’s belly, so they could be worshipped by all beings. According to the Old Monk, when the Buddha statue fell and the bones inside flew out and killed the destroyers, this was precisely the mysterious retribution spoken of in Buddhist doctrine!